10/13/2023
Earlier this week, I posted video & shared my experience with Union Parish Louisiana Sheriff Dusty Gates. I was publicly called out by the daughter of the judge who oversaw the Louisiana portion of our case & would like to address what was posted. I understand some of you may not agree but many of the people this reached was family & dear friends in Union Parish so I respectfully ask you to read my response & at least put yourself in my shoes for a moment.
1. My original post (still visible on my page with video if you would like to review it) was done by me and me alone, no one else so please don't blame anyone but me.
2. I want the Judges daughter (I’m not posting her name here since many others around the world see my page as well & this is a local issue) & all of you to know that my original post was not in any way to try to be negative about her Dad. In my in-person dealings with him, I have found him to be fair, honest, up-front, & nothing but professional. Even though he may not know the full story, I believe he has done his very best & my little Sister & I do appreciate him for being the first Judge to actually allow us to be heard in his court. Being heard as a child/teen seems to be something of a rarity in other courts & he actually allowed that. We are so thankful & deeply appreciate that. In fact EVERYONE at Union Parish Court House has always been nothing but nice & respectful to us & we only have good things to say about them! They are an asset to our Parish & we will forever be grateful.
3. I personally believe that it is highly inappropriate for the daughter of the Judge to be commenting on a private case (sealed & not open to the public) that her Father is directly involved in. Especially a case that dealt with minors. At best, the information she has is second hand, however, I was there, I know ALL the details. I lived it. I still have nightmares about it.
4. I stand by EVERY SINGLE THING I posted in my original post. It is 100% TRUTH & it can be proven. You see, there were 4 video cameras recording when this all happened, 2 of which were on our bodies. Those 2 remained with us & recording until the early hours of the morning when we were finally being processed at a lockup facility. We have hours upon hours of recordings, they have all been reviewed by our attorneys & I can guarantee you AT NO TIME WERE WE DISRESPECTFUL to ANYONE during this ordeal. The audio/video does not lie. Our many friends in Union Parish who know me personally can vouch for my character & respect.
5. There are quite a few factual things in her posts that simply aren't factual but I don't want to get into a back and forth here on legal details. The bottom line is, if you would like to know more about how this originated & ended up in Louisiana, Google my name or perhaps "Rockett vs. Eighmy". It’s a federal court case where we are suing the MO Judge who caused all of this in the first place. The Supreme Court ruled against him, removed him from dealing with us, reversed his rulings & he was stripped of his immunity to face a jury trial next year for what he did to us. Lots of national & international news articles on this but literally NOTHING in the Union Parish area where some of this went down. I was not allowed to speak publicly about this for nearly 3 years, thus the reason I am finally speaking out now.
6. Our issues with Sheriff Gates are because we met with him in his office 2 times, explained everything that was going on to him, showed him the legal papers, answered his questions & he promised to protect us while we were in Union Parish. He shook our hands, looked us in the eye & gave us his cell phone number. He knew the order in MO could not possibly be valid as he knew we did not live there, knew the backstory on why the judge there was trying to involve himself, plus we showed him the laws (Federal, State, & UCCJEA) & the fact that the Supreme Court was in the process of issuing their ruling when he did the opposite of what he promised. The Judges daughter says Sheriff Gates was just following a court order & they even gave us a courtesy call but that's not the whole story. She left out some key details regarding the validity of the MO order his orders were based upon that she may not be aware of but the Sheriff certainly was! We were never given the opportunity to share these facts with the LA Judge prior to enforcement & Sheriff Gates had PROMISED US that we would have this chance if the order was ever filed in Louisiana! We were NOT given a courtesy call, our Grandfather was called but we were not there. We arrived to complete chaos, called our attorneys & followed their advice on every single move we made thereafter. We did not resist, we were NOT DISRESPECTFUL, we did not commit any crime or were accused of committing any crime. We were not even parties to the case in question! We called Sheriff Gates directly & he ignored our call while almost immediately taking one from one of his deputies standing at our homestead. He had lots of options here but chose the most harmful one to us.
Nothing anyone can say to me can convince me it was or is ever ok to place innocent kids in handcuffs, not allow them to eat & sleep deprive them for hours, subject them to psychological exams, & lock them in solitary confinement jail cells for 2 days is appropriate. Basic common sense says this is NOT ok to do to kids. The psychological harm, the nightmares, the distrust of authorities, I could go on & on. THIS WAS A CUSTODY ISSUE NOT A CRIMINAL ISSUE, yet it was treated like a criminal issue. Sherrif Gates was operating with a PICKUP ORDER, NOT an arrest warrant. There was no need to treat us the way we were treated. There was no need to place us in handcuffs & leave us locked up for as long as we were! There was no need to make us go without food & deprive us from sleep for so many hours. I stand behind everything I said in my original post & my calling it what it is: ABUSE. If Sheriff Gates had just waited a mere 12 hours, (simply the next morning instead of doing this overnight) the official Supreme Court ruling would be out like we told him & this would never have happened! (Look up how many other Union Parrish warrants are just waiting currently & you might wonder WHY a pickup order was so urgent when we were perfectly safe, where we wanted to be, & where we still are to this very day!)
The bottom line here is I lived this & I deal with the nightmares from it. No one could possibly understand the hurt/damage it has caused except for my little Sister & I. You are more than welcome to disagree with my vote for Sheriff all you want, you can even believe what you want about my motives/involvement/timing but please don’t ever again accuse me of being disrespectful or lying about what happened that night because the full audio/video will clearly show that is NOT the case.
I will never be able to get the sound of my little Sisters sobbing & me not being able to protect her that night out of my head. I will continue to do everything I can to create awareness, new case law (our case is actually being used in some law schools to train future lawyers/judges), & call for change so that something like this NEVER happens to other innocent children/teens.
Whoever has read this far, I sincerely thank you for giving me the time you have given to at least let me share my heart. I love Louisiana, & so many of the wonderful people who call it home. It will always be my “homestead” & regardless of who agrees or disagrees with me, I’ll always stand up for the truth & what I believe in.
